I need to make one correction, the sileage leachate was being
dumped by the terragator which is a giant three wheeled manure hauler. He
would suck it up out of the sileage leachate holding area and back up to the
edge of a hill and dump the whole load. There were three tanker trucks
hauling from Vreba Hoff II to Vreba Hoff I. Lynn

As DEQ officials continue trying to close the Pandora's
box opened by CAFOs and spring runoff in the manure disaster in south central
Michigan, word comes that local citizens have filmed two of the seven tanker
trucks they witnessed dumping silage leachate down a hill into a county drain
at the Vreba Hoff 1 Dairy. Environmentally Concerned Citizens of South Central
Michigan (ECCSCM) president John Klein and vice president Lynn Henning filmed
the trucks pouring the wastes onto the hillside above the drain.
Downstream in this same drain just two days ago, dissolved oxygen (DO)
readings were tested at 0.7 mg/L, effectively guaranteeing that all aquatic
life has been killed in this waterway.

Silage leachate is waste
water from silage, a livestock feed created by chopping up whole stalks of
corn and storing it in bunkers or silos. Silage leachate is one of the less
well known but environmentally devastating pollutants associated with large
scale animal factories such as dairies. ECCSCM water testers last year caught
an illegal discharge of silage leachate when DO levels dropped to this same
outrageously low level.

A paper by MSU Agriculture Extension staff from
2002 explains that silage leachate "when discharged into surface water can
remove so much oxygen that fish and other aquatic creatures die immediately",
contains nutrients harmful to groundwater, and is so acidic that it can
actually burn or kill vegetation (see http://www.maeap.org/education_controlling_silage_leachate.pdf ). By testing for both E.coli bacteria and dissolved oxygen, ECCSCM
has discovered illegal discharges of a variety of different kinds in their
community.

Temporary dam holding, but streams and drains
full of manure

The temporary dam holding millons of manure
contaminated water on a field at the Vreba Hoff 2 facility is reportedly still
holding, and water is being pumped out and shipped to a lagoon at Vreba Hoff
1, however photos today of waterways around the facility show huge
amounts of milky grey brown water that reportedly smells strongly of manure
rushing out of tiles and culverts, through drains and downstream into lakes
and streams. Compared to photos earlier this week, the amount of manure water
running into and through surface waters is much greater now.

One
challenge now for locals is that as the DEQ moves toward enforcement, less and
less information is available to the public about the measures taken, even for
those whose yeoman volunteer efforts have helped identify the sources of the
contamination. No public announcements have been made by the state or
feds about the disaster underway, and so as the nightmare that has become
their community continues to unfold, many remain totally in the dark about
enforcement actions, about even the emergency actions to try to address the
pathogen contaminated waters. Perhaps there is a site, phone numbers, or
other public information source that someone can suggest where local people
can find out about an unfolding disaster like this as it is taking place so
that people know they must avoid contact with the water?